1. Field of the Invention
The invention relates generally to the field of photography, and in particular to film cassettes containing roll film.
2. Description of the Prior Art
Commonly assigned U.S. Pat. No. 5,025,274, issued Jun. 18, 1991 discloses a film cassette wherein the filmstrip, including a non-protruding film leader, is coiled about a spool inside a light-tight cassette shell. Rotation of the spool in an unwinding direction can propel, i.e. thrust, the film leader out of the shell regardless of whether the filmstrip is unexposed, only partly exposed, or fully exposed. Various film exposure status indicia are printed on the shell which form respective visible indications that the filmstrip is unexposed, partly exposed, or fully exposed. A pointer is fixed to one end of the spool to be aligned initially with the unexposed indicium and to be aligned thereafter with the partly exposed indicium or the fully exposed indicium responsive to rotation of the spool to corresponding angular positions. A disk fixed to another end of the spool has a film information bar code. The bar code, when optically detected during rotation of the spool in a winding direction to rewind the filmstrip into the shell, provides a measure of the angular position of the spool to facilitate its being stopped with the pointer aligned with the partly exposed indicium or the fully exposed indicium.
Commonly assigned U.S. Pat. No. 5,032,854, issued Jul. 16, 1991 discloses a film cassette similar to the one disclosed in U.S Pat. No. 5,025,274 except that the pointer is printed on the disk radially inward of the bar code, rather than being located remotely from the disk as in the latter patent. However, with the pointer located radially inward of the bar code, one might visually confuse one of the discrete bars of the bar code for the pointer.